CCBlogs thinking critically, living faithfully

Martha Hoverson's blog

My first task at my new job, before I could even reach the office on the first day, was to visit a woman in the hospital, a woman who was dying. I sat with her family, the people who loved her, and I felt, as I always do, what a privilege it is to be with people at such moments. We talked about the future and how, very soon, this woman, this mother, this wife would be in God's embrace. It sounded personal, because an embrace, by its very nature, is intimate. Children spoke of the people gone on before, now awaiting Mother's arrival. And the room filled with love.

God's love can be present in many ways. Our lack of love won't keep God away, but our love can serve as a conduit for God's, making that feeling of warmth and comfort palpable to those who need it most. And that can be any one of us, at crucial moments in our lives: a birth, a death, a disappointment or an ending.

This Sunday will be Mother's Day, a holiday invented for a political purpose but hijacked by florists and greeting card companies. Whether or not it should matter to us, Mother's Day can make us feel euphoric or lonely, delighted or disappointed. Perhaps we had a difficult relationship with our mother, or we wanted to have children and couldn't, or our relationship with the children we did have is strained; there are many reasons to feel left out on Mother's Day. .... READ MORE.